Things I want my kids to know

Being the person who always steps in to fix things and take care of people is a lovely quality, but it can be exhausting. This tendency can come from a few different places:

• Feeling very strongly for other people, so the idea that of someone else struggling with something is intolerable and you feel the need to try and fix it.

• Feeling guilty about not offering help if you can. A sort of “If I can help, I should” Kind of thing.

• Having learned that your role is one of service and that this is how you have value.

Now, being a person who is willing to step in and help other people is a great thing to be. However, that’s not what causes problems. The problems come when it isn’t something that you like or want to do, but it is something that you need to do. The reason that becomes an issue is that this doesn’t give you much choice or flexibility. When you need to help, some of the behaviours you might see from yourself are:

• Offering help or solutions as your default response when someone even mentions a problem, regardless of whether they have actually asked for any or need any.

• Offering to help regardless of whether or not you actually have the time or the energy, and whether you had any existing plans of your own.

• When someone tries to share how they feel with you, you might lead with solution-finding rather than just offering some empathy and a hug.

• Minimising or ignoring your own needs, and actively pushing away offers of help from others.

Maybe you will be OK with that approach for a while, but it will soon fall down if it comes across one of these stumbling blocks:

• There are too many problems to fix

• The problems I am trying to fix are not in my gift

When a need to help or fix things is combined with an unachievable list of problems, you might find yourself unable to relax. Feeling guilty or on edge, or just being busy all the time. It is at this point that you might also find yourself feeling exhausted or resentful, particularly because nobody else seems to be putting in as much effort or energy as you, and nobody seems to be offering to help you the way you offer help to others.

That’s not only exhausting. It’s also pretty lonely.

When you are trying to fix problems that just are not in your gift to fix, such as seeing someone in emotional turmoil and needing to make them feel better, you might be spending all your mental and physical time and energy trying to find solutions or options for them, and then being met with not only a lack of success but perhaps frustration or anger from them. I particularly hear this from parents when their kids are languishing, suffering or in a place where they don’t know what to do with themselves: it feels like something we should be trying to fix, but actually it isn’t fully in our control. We can offer help and assistance if they want it, but we can’t force them to accept our help. Sometimes this is made worse by the sense that we should be able to fix this issue. That it makes us a bad parent / partner / friend if we can’t solve the problems of the people we love.

That’s exhausting too, with the added turmoil of the friction it creates.

If this sounds like you, it can be useful to think about the difference between:

• I need to help (I will not take no for an answer)

• I want to help (I am on the sidelines itching to get involved)

• I am available to help (I am here if you need me)

When you try out the stance of being available to help instead of needing to help, you can practice:

• Empathy over solutions: lead with empathy first and foremost. “That sounds really hard” and offering emotional support like hugs, presence or time, rather than going straight in with all your solutions.

• Stating that you are available if needed, and respecting the other person’s right to not take you up on that offer.

• Asking for help yourself, or being more honest about how you are doing so that it is easier for people to see when you might need some.

Being someone who wants to help other people is a wonderful quality, but it works best when it’s a choice, rather than a need.

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Thanks for reading. Until next week,

Ted

P.S. A challenging part of making this change sometimes is the fact that the people around you get used to you being the fixer and the person who takes responsibility, and they don’t always like it when you step back. Teenage or adult children for whom you still make breakfast every day might not be that happy when you take a step back, as an example. But that’s the point: you are worth caring for too, and sometimes in order to do that, it requires tolerating other people’s discomfort for a while.